The present invention relates generally to beverage dispensers, and more particularly to such dispensers which use a water bath, ice bank system to effect the cooling of the beverage.
In water bath, ice bank cooling systems, it has been conventional to use a separate compressor for each water bath in the system, thus requiring multiple compressors for multiple water baths. Similarly, combined beverage dispensers and ice makers of conventional design have typically utilized more than one compressor, including one for the evaporator in each water bath used to chill the beverage, and one for the evaporator used to freeze the water to form the ice in the ice maker. This use of more than one compressor in the same refrigeration system is expensive. Moreover, the incidence of compressor failure increases when more than one compressor is used.